


Insanity is Close to Infinity

by FranklyFrazzled



Category: Football RPF
Genre: AU, M/M, Mental Instability
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-28
Updated: 2014-05-09
Packaged: 2018-01-21 02:40:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,664
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1534595
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FranklyFrazzled/pseuds/FranklyFrazzled
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Pick a flower on Earth and you move the farthest star- Paul Dirac</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this years ago. In about a million different ways. And yet I only just realized that if I deleted all the unfinished versions, it was actually done. Go figure.Also I don't claim to know anything about mental illness.

It isn't until long after Steven hears the shower turn on in the bathroom that he finally allows himself to relax, if only by a small fraction. He wanders through the bedroom, rubbing the back of his neck awkwardly as he observes his surroundings. He's been here... he can't remember the last time he was at Xabi's apartment. It had been so long, things between them strained. With everything between them, he understands how necessary it is to keep certain parts of their lives separate. He has Alex and Xabi has his apartment. Steven understands all too well why Xabi would want to keep him out.

            Everything is neat. Not overbearingly like his own flat but more so in a comfortable manner. For some reason it is a bit upsetting. With the mess that is Xabier Alonso, his home was the epitome of normal and good, which seemed to be an unfair juxtaposition. But that wasn't exactly fair to say either. Today had been a good day. A better day than most. Steven should really learn not to be bitter and hold such things against him. And he doesn't. Most of the time.

            He makes his way over to a bookshelf. It is filled, as is to be expected, with a mixture of educational texts with a few novels sprinkled into the mix. A tattered purple book, smaller than all the rest catches his eye. For the sake of having something to do, he picks it up and flips to the first page.

            “This is the saddest story I have ever heard.” The bitterness returns. He turns to the cover again and sees the author's name, Ford Maddox Ford, in bold lettering. “You don't know anything about sad,” Steven tells the book and Mr. Ford, not noticing that the water has already turned off and a pair of footsteps have stopped behind him.

            “What are you doing?” Xabi asks quietly, as if he's trying not to disturb the room around them. Steven turns and sees him toweling his hair dry, dressed in jeans and a simple shirt. He looks good, normal, as if he actually belongs in the well put together room. Like he was just anouther adult male off the streets. Only more beautiful, because if there was anything, for all that has happened, he was always beautiful.

            When Steven doesn't reply, Xabi takes the book from him and holds it in his hands for a moment with his lips turned slightly downward in a pensive frown. “Tell me I'm not Nancy and you're not John. Tell me.” But Steven can't because he doesn't even know who they are. He's never read the book. The silence hurts Xabi and he rips the book in half at the spine and tosses the pieces violently at the wall before crumbling to the ground and ordering Steven to leave his home.

            It had been a good day. The first in awhile. But as Steven collects his friend from the floor and transports him to the bed with mechanic and well practiced motions; he knows that he shouldn't have expected so much out of a good day.

 

            Every time Xabi runs away, Steven somehow finds him. No matter how far he goes or how hard he tries to be discreet. Steven always shows up at some point with a tired look in his eye and open arms. They're arms that are out to get him, smother the fight out of him. Arms that want to keep him still and stationary. They're also comforting, loving arms, the only place Xabi feels safe and sane. It's a complicated relationship they have, him and Steven's arms.

            Xabi's tried medication. The majority of his youth is an inconsequential blur because of it. He hates the idea of having a life unlived rather than a life of delusions. He likes his delusions. They're calculating, methodological, and crisp: Just like him. They're solid and make him feel like he can stand on his own two feet like he can't in the normal world. In the normal world the ground feels like sliding sand and he needs Steven's arms to steady himself. He hates that he's so dependent on another person in the real world, hates that he's ruined that person in the worst way possible.

            They'd met when everything was still okay. He'd just moved to England and began hiding his pills under his tongue so his parents wouldn't realize he'd broken free of his chemical prison. He was careful to keep his mind in check, to keep other people close enough to seem normal but far enough away so they couldn't notice he was anything but. These were the happiest years of his life. This is when he met Steven.

 

            Steven fell in love with Xabi when they were just fifteen. He was newly transferred into the latter boy's form after starting one too many fights with a boy named Frank Lampard. They were separated for their own good but Steven couldn't see anything beyond how unjust it was that he was being forced into a new form while Frank got to stay behind with all of their friends. But then he met Xabi and he slowly stopped caring about any of the people he had left behind. Soon he met Xabi and he stopped caring about anyone else at all.

            It's simple really. Xabi was smart, Basque (sometimes had problems saying the letter “v” despite trying very hard), and attractive. But, above all of that, he was simply kind. He spent the majority of his time making small talk with every person in the room, making them feel like they were the closest friends instead of just acquaintances. He liked to make sure everyone was comfortable and appreciated. He was always so focused on being available to everyone that Xabi didn't seem to have time to make any close friendships that actually meant something.

            Steven was alright with this arrangement for awhile- always feeling a bit cheerier whenever it was his turn to bask in the other boy's attention. Slowly through-out the year, however, he realized he wanted more than he was being given. He wanted to actually be friends with the other boy. This can be noted as the place where everything began to go wrong for him, at the tender age of fifteen.

            The first mistake Steven Gerrard ever made that had any lasting consequences was deciding to force his way into Xabi Alonso's life. He did it slowly, inserting himself in games of football or slyly insisting to be his partner during class assignments. He assimilated himself into the other boy's life as quietly as a ghost or shadow, making sure not to scare him off.

            Xabi never said anything about it. If he noticed what Steven was up to, he let it slide. They became friends, or as close to friends as the Basque would allow. They were inseparable at school but as soon as the bell rung for the last time of the day, they were off to different sides of the city with no chance of meeting up. Xabi never hung out outside of school. Ever.

            It was a Monday that Steven fell in love. Just your average winter day with half of the class running around like maniacs trying to study for the biggest exam of the year. Papers were flying, stressed voices squealed out questions at each other. Chaos would be a good word to describe the scene, chaos for all except Steven and Xabi of course.

            Steven, well, he didn't even know what the test was going to be on. He couldn't have studied for it even if he had wanted to. (He wasn't a bad student, just easily distracted and unmotivated, as his teacher had once tried to explain to his concerned parents. Head in the clouds, or more accurately out the window.) Plus, Xabi had shown up that day wearing glasses, the first time that had ever happened, and it was such a distracting change he wouldn't have been able to focus on anything else anyways.

            “Near sighted or far?” he asked.

            “Hm?” Xabi looked up from the textbook he had been reading, studying in a much calmer manner than everyone else in the room.

            “Your glasses, are you near or far sighted?”

            It took the other boy a moment before he grabbed the glasses in question and suddenly laughed in realization as to what he had been talking about. “Oh no, my eyesight is perfect,” Xabi answered with a smile. “The lenses are just regular glass.”

            Steven gave him a skeptical look. “Then why are you wearing them?”

            “It's for my eyesight.” Blank stare. “When I am stressed, sometimes my eyes go a bit fuzzy. So I got these into tricking them into working right. Like the placebo affect only I know about it. I know it's a bit silly, but it was my dad's idea when I was a kid and it kind of stuck.” Xabi gave a small, embarrassed shrug and offered the eye-ware to Steven to see for himself. The other boy put them on slowly, preparing himself to see the world from Xabi's perspective but was only disappointed to see that it was the same as his own. When he gave the glasses back, the soft look on Xabi's face caused Steven to blush and bite his lip. This can be pin-pointed as the exact moment he fell in love.

            It was a few months later, on a Thursday in Spring, that Steven decided to tell Xabi how he felt. “I have feelings for you. I kind of love you. More than football or anything else in the Universe.”

            “No.”

            “It wasn't a question, stupid. I'm telling you,” he'd huffed.

            “Whatever answer you want me to give you, no.”

            This was the first time Xabi broke his heart. It was by no means the last. But Steven is a fighter. He doesn't believe in the word no. He wanted to win him over. “Well, let me be your best friend then? I care for you. I don't mind if we do it this way.”

            “I... I would like that.” Steven almost didn't believe that he had agreed. They became best friends. This was his second mistake. He held on to hope. He stayed close. He continued to love Xabi, despite everything in the past, present, and future that should have warned him against it. He only has himself to blame.

 

            Xabi knew better than to get too close to anyone. He knew that forming close relationships could lead to nothing but trouble. But with Steven he found himself becoming reckless. He liked spending time with the other boy. He felt normal and appreciated with him. He figured, in an uncharacteristic moment of selfishness, that he could afford to have one friend. One couldn't hurt, not if he was extra careful.

            He knew better than to let Steven in but he did anyways.

 

            It didn't happen all at once. Gradually over time, Steven began to notice the changes. Xabi wore his glasses more often, he was more distant, he began retreating into himself. They were seventeen, Steven had just turned eighteen, and they were about to graduate high school. It seemed like the perfect time to bring up those three little words again. He thought for sure time would have made the difference.

            He even broke up with his girlfriend at the time in preparation. They'd been dating for a few months but he had never really been that interested in the girl. Not really. But when Xabi and her friend had gone off together at a party they had all been at, he'd asked her out right away. They became an official couple while Xabi and his own girl had just been a one night stand. (Every now and then Steven asked a girl out, dated her for awhile and then let it fizzle out. Xabi's relationships never lasted more than a few hours. He never had any intention of ever letting them last longer than that. He didn't like it when people got too close.)

            “Steven, please, stop it. I can't be with you,” Xabi had said with exasperation filling his voice.

            “Look, just give me a reason. Anything, and I won't bring it up again. Am I too dumb for you? Do you not think I'm attractive? Fuck, do you love someone else?” It's hard to be in love with your best friend. Steven tried to make it look easy, like it wasn't the most frustrating position in the world to be in but sometimes he really didn't want to put on a brave face anymore.

            “It's not any of those things. I can't love you back. I couldn't love anyone back. You would not understand,” the Basque muttered, tracing a figure-eight with his finger into the dirt on the ground. He wasn't looking Steven in the eye, he had been doing that less and less, and stared only at the pattern, something he was doing more and more. (Scribbling strange patterns everywhere. All over his notebooks, homework, textbooks, and when he thought no one was looking, on desks and walls as well. Steven never asked, only quietly observed, not sure what it was all supposed to mean.)

            But this was a break through. Instead of the short pleas for Steven to simply drop the subject, Xabi had given him an in. Some kind of clue about what was going on in that head of his. “What do you mean? Loving is easy, all you have to do is give it a try. I can teach you, I swear,” Steven smiled suggestively but instead of being teased, Xabi's frame stiffened and his hand froze.

            “I don't love you. I will never love you. In the grander scheme of things, it doesn't matter if I feel something for you or not. It doesn't matter what happens between us because compared to the world, we are insignificant. Then, compared to the galaxy, our planet is nothing. And then compared to the Universe in general! Me and you might as well not exist. We are less than ants. We are like electrons in size but without nearly the same significance.” His hands were trembling, there was something foreign in his eyes.

            Steven's mouth hung slightly open in surprise at the outburst. “You... You can't love me because the universe is big?”

            Xabi rubbed his eyes, fingering the glasses Steven knew to be in his jacket pocket. “Please, just leave it alone. I don't expect you to understand or even stick around for that matter. Why won't you just leave me alone?” his voice easily slipped into exhaustion.

            “Because... Because I love you,” Steven said, willing the words to fill with the emotion he knew he was feeling and that the object of his desire couldn't seem to comprehend.

            “Love doesn't mean a damn thing.” Xabi left Steven alone with the slowly fading malice of his words and that stupid picture of the figure-eight in the dirt. In a moment of complete helplessness and anger, Steven kicked the picture, sending dirty flying in the direction Xabi had taken. None of it was fair or made sense. But in love, whatever does?

 

            It was Mikel that told him. It was after Xabi had run away that summer, escaping to Spain and insisted no one follow him. Steven didn't understand what was going on or the shifty look on everyone in the Alonso family's face when he demanded to know why he had just left and why they were listening to him and not forcing him to come back home.

            They had always known that Xabi was different. Always. When he was a child, they had simply thought his eccentricities could be linked to sugary treats or being high spirited. What else were they supposed to believe? It wasn't until he was eleven that they all began to realize that something was wrong with him. Something that couldn't be explained away by saying he'd spent too much time out in the sun or that there was a full moon out.

            “I was the one who found him,” Mikel had said quietly, not wanting his parents to overhear the story he was telling Steven. He knew they could not bear to hear the details once more- already having to relive the incident in their heads every day in and out. Xabi hadn't wanted anyone to know, especially not Steven, but Mikel knew from the moment he heard that his brother had fled the country and locked himself up in their summer home that it wasn't something that they could keep to themselves anymore. He could think of no other person who had more of a chance than the Englishman before him at bringing his brother back. True love has its perks.         

            “Mom and dad were at a dinner party and I had just come home from a friend's house. I wasn't supposed to have been out, I was supposed to be watching him but I thought eleven was old enough to spend a few hours alone,” he paused. Steven expected him to look guilty at the admission but that was the difference between the two of them. While Mikel knew there was nothing he could do but love his brother, Steven would be the one to think a lack of response in Xabi's condition was a failure on his own behalf.

            “I thought it was strange all the lights were out when I got home but I didn't think too much about it, you know? Then I got inside and none of the switches worked. It was pitch dark, I couldn't see my hand in front of my face. I called out to him but he didn't answer and I began to worry. I thought burglars had got him or something. He was pretty small for his age back then. Wouldn't have been able to fight back or anything.

            “I went to check his room but I didn't even get through the kitchen before I noticed it. Broken glass all over the floor. It crunched every time I took a step, it was everywhere. I tried calling for him some more, but he wouldn't answer me.” Mikel stopped, looking so incredibly _sad_ as he remembered what happened next that Steven didn't have the heart to interrupt despite his pounding heart's need to know. When he snapped out of it, Mikel offered a tired smile and shrugged his shoulders, somewhat defeatedly.

            “I don't understand,” Steven said, trying to encourage him onwards. “Did someone break in and get him?” Images of Xabi as a child being held at gunpoint filtered through his mind. His blood began to boil, imagining thieves picking on an innocent child. But burglars didn't explain anything. Not in the long run. Not why Mikel was telling him this story now after Xabi had run away. It didn't tell him a damn thing.

            “He had done it himself. Every light bulb in the house, shattered. I found him in one of the bathrooms arranging the glass into piles by candle light. His hands and feet were bleeding from the glass but it was like he didn't even feel it. I didn't know what to do. I kept yelling at him, 'What are you doing? What the hell are you doing?' but he never answered me. I was so scared. He's my little brother and I didn't know what to do. He kept mumbling to himself, it was like I wasn't even there.”

            Steven rubbed his hands over his face, trying to take in all this new information. Mikel was looking at him with expectant eyes that seemed to shout, “Do you understand now? Do you understand everything now? Don't make me say it, do you understand?” He just shook his head. “Just come out with it. What was wrong with him?”

            “I had to pry him away from the glass, kicking and screaming. I bandaged all his cuts and forced him into bed. He fell asleep instantly, like he had been asleep the entire time. When my parents came home I told them what I had seen him doing. They didn't know what to do. The next morning he woke up normal.

            “He told me he could remember everything that happened. It had made sense in his mind, everything that he was doing. He asked me why it had made so much sense then but now seemed so crazy. I didn't know what to tell him. He was different from then on. It was like he knew that it was only a matter of time until the sickness came back again to take him for good. He was just eleven.”

            Steven had wanted to ask about the doctors. Wanted to know what they had made of him and why hadn't they fixed him. But one look at Mikel and he already knew. He could remember Xabi after a bad tackle at football practice, refusing to go to the doctors with a fear so sincere the coach had just let him go home instead. He'd been to doctors before and they had poked, prodded, and drugged him to high hell. It was no way to live, half alive and a victim to the pills that were supposed to make him “normal”. He made his choice. He was more afraid of being taken away by the doctors and their medicine than being taken away by whatever it was eating away at his mind. He'd rather nature take its course.

            On the plane ride to Spain, because was there really any doubt that he would be going?, the only thing Steven could think about was Mikel's apologetic sounding goodbye. “He loves you, you know. He just can't allow himself to have you.” Another mistake in a long lifetime of mistakes was Steven thinking he could somehow cure Xabi and that they could be together. It's a delusion, even through all the years, he held on to and found himself unable to let go of.

 

            It took months but felt more like an eternity. The man that Steven loved was in there, somewhere beneath the manic behavior. Every now and then there would be a glimpse of the real Xabi, coming out from the depths of the shadows for a peek at what had become of the real world while he had been away. He must have never liked what he saw, always deciding to go back into the recesses of his mind instead of staying for good.

            It was almost impossible to witness. Steven felt like he was attempting some kind of Herculean task trying to help Xabi but he was no demigod. The weight of his friend's illness was too much for him to bare all by himself at times. But what could he do? Xabi wouldn't let anyone else near him. He only trusted Steven and that was only on a good day- of which there were too few.

            So Steven did the only thing he could. He had faith. He held strong. He took everything that was thrown at him like an impermeable wall. Every time his heart felt like it would simply break open, seeing the person he loved so disconnected with reality, he tried to keep calm and be helpful. He bathed him, fed him, held him when he became frustrated and violent- like a child in a way- he focused on the little things in hope that it would be enough and one morning he would merely wake up normal as Mikel had described he once had so many years before.

            And then one morning, when everything seemed hopeless and even the weather had taken a dark turn for the worse, that's exactly what had happened. Steven awoke to the smell of a scrumptious breakfast being prepared wafting through the house. He'd wearily gotten up, afraid of what he would find in the kitchen when he got there.

            The house, which had been a mess all summer (homemade bouquets of flowers that Xabi, on a good day, had once explained were meant to be galaxies [“ _Pick a flower on earth_ and you _move the farthest star.”]_ had ruled the entire home ) was immaculately clean. Everything looked as though it had been scrubbed down for a new beginning. And in the kitchen Xabi had set a beautiful table for two and sat at there as if nothing had happened at all over the last three months. That everything had been perfectly normal and this was how they always spent their mornings.

            Steven didn't know if he was supposed to laugh or cry. Instead he settled for sitting down and staring in disbelief at his best friend.

            “I never wanted you to have to deal with this. I never wanted you to know. You shouldn't have come,” was the first thing Xabi said, his eyes anywhere but on Steven. The shame was so evident in his defeated posture it made it difficult to process his cold and distant words.

            But Steven understood. After months of never being away from the other man's side during his terrible break with reality, there was very little about Xabi he would not be able to understand. (He could read every adjustment to his shoulder or twitch of his fingers to the tee. Every sniff or changing pitch of his voice, he could pull apart and comprehend better than the most brilliantly described text book. But the one thing Steven would never understand about Xabi was the most important thing of all. He would never understand why he was the way he was. He would never understand the reason he would at times slip away from the real world and find himself drowning in the depths of his own mind.)

           “When I told you I loved you, I meant it. I'm going to take the bad with the good, even if this is what the bad is going to be like. Even if the bad ultimately outweighs the good. That's what love is. You don't have to be so afraid of loving me back. I'm going to still be here.”

            “I'm not afraid of you freaking out and leaving me!” Xabi burst, slamming his fist down onto the table, rattling the plates. “I'm afraid of you staying! Don't you see, Steven? I can't control this. There's nothing I can do. If you stay you will be miserable and I will destroy you too.” There was a desperate plea in his eyes but Steven was always the stubborn one. He shook his head.

            “Then I'll be your friend. Just like before. If you won't have me, fine. But you can't get rid of me. I took care of you this summer. You owe me for that. I'm not letting you just throw me away.” He held firm, locking eyes with the man across the table until the Spaniard sank into his chair.

            “It won't be easy.”

            “Love never is.”

 

            “You're still here,” Xabi says quietly, waking up to find Steven reading on the foot of his bed. He pinches the bridge of his nose tightly, a habit he had developed when he'd put the fake glasses away for good at some point during their college years. It's how Steven could tell he was back, if only for a while.

            He hums in response, barely looking up from the book in his hands, carefully put back together with scotch tape. He knows Xabi would be looking at him apologetically, large eyes begging forgiveness for something he had no control over. He doesn’t want to see it. Friendship had worked for them. For years they were as close as any two people not in an active romantic relationship could be. After the last time Xabi had slipped away, however, things had changed. Now Steven was married with a little girl and another on the way. There was a space between them that had not existed since that summer ten years ago and Steven has become all the more bitter at their situation. He doesn't want to be. He doesn't want to blame the other man so he just doesn't look up anymore.

            Xabi sits up, leaning against the headboard and pulls the covers tightly up to his chest. “What are you reading?” he asks gently. He knows the score. How can he not?

            “The book from before. I wanted to know what you were yelling about.” Because Steven isn't looking, he doesn't see the hurt and shame that crosses Xabi's face. The other man just nods and watches him silently.

            Nearly ten minutes pass by and Steven is sure that Xabi has fallen back asleep when he hears him say, “You're upset with me.

            He sighs, closing the book and shaking his head. “No, no. You know I'm not.”

            “You are. I'm insane, not stupid.” The words come out more biting than Xabi had intended them. He tries in a softer tone, “You're upset that you stayed all those years ago and now there's no escaping me. You don't have to lie. I won't be upset if you admit it.” He suddenly smiles, trying to lighten up the dark mood. “Either that or you're upset because you still want to fuck me. You can tell me.”

            Steven places the book deliberately down on the corner of the bed and crawls his way up to his friend, face unreadable and eyes unwavering. “I want you. Still. After everything that has happened in the past ten years. I want you. I love you. You will never drive me away. If I'm ever upset, it's because after all this time you're still trying to get rid of me. Just love me back. It's all I've ever asked.” He nuzzles his face against Xabi's before leaning in for a kiss. The other man moves his head to the side, causing Steven's lips to find his cheek instead of mouth.

            “You're married,” Xabi says weakly when Steven quickly gets off of him and stands to leave. “Alex is a wonderful woman. Things between you are good. I don't want to destroy that. I've destroyed too much of you already.”

            His pathetic protests drown in the sound of his apartment door slamming shut. But Steven won't be gone for long. It's the mistake he keeps making. Thinking that love and time will be enough, even though they both know the battle has already been lost.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I posted this originally on Livejournal in 2010 as a stand alone when I couldn't figure out where it fit in the story. And the answer was that it doesn't.

“He's going to marry you, you know,” Xabi said, breaking a self imposed silence for the first time in a few hours. The last time he had said anything, it was at breakfast when he announced that he thought he might go for a swim at the beach. Steven had opted out, saying he was going back to bed (having only risen at such an early hour because Xabi had insisted they all eat together on their last day of their trip). Jamie and Nicola had said no as well, deciding their time was better off spent packing and preparing for the flight back home. But Alex, surprising them all, had said that she would go with him.

They changed into their swimming suits and headed off together but the moment they came near the water, Xabi had stopped walking and sat in an empty chair instead of going for a dip. Alex noted how his body seemed to lag, looking worn despite the energetic and youthful way he had walked just moments before. She laid back a bit, figuring she would work on her tan but saw how he kept his chair upright, eyes never leaving the sea.

They had never spent that much time together before. At least not alone. She and Steven hadn't been together for that long and it just never worked out that they got to have a little one on one time. The entire trip (organized by Xabi) had been a bit mysterious in origin but he had called it a last hurrah without ever telling anyone what exactly was ending. She figured this would be her chance to get to know the man that her boyfriend considered the most important person in his life a bit better. (He would never call Xabi that out loud, it was too cheesy and girly, but she knew that's how he really felt. It was hard to miss the heart Steven wore on his sleeve.) But as time passed, neither of them spoke.

She knew Xabi wasn't the talkative type. He liked to watch the waves and reflect on the motion of the tides or poetry or whatever it was going on in that head of his. She, however, was a talker. The entire time they sat together, she was practically jumping out of her skin to say, “So you're the infamous Xabi, then? Steven talks about you so much I feel as if I know you already! It really warms my heart to know you two are such good friends.” But she didn't want to ruin his peaceful moment so she stayed anxiously quiet instead.

When he broke the silence instead, it caught her by surprise. A part of her had feared that he had completely forgotten that she had come with him so his choice of conversation topic caught her off guard. “I don't know about that!” she answered with a laugh, trying to hide a blush, embarrassed with how pleased she felt to hear him say that. “We haven't really been going together for very long. It's too soon to talk about things like that.”

“But I am telling you, when the time is right, he's going to ask you. I might not be around when that happens. Alex, I am going to be leaving soon. But when he does ask you, I want you to remember that I knew it first. Before him even.” She didn't have time to ask where he was going because Xabi rose from his chair and gave her a charming smile. “I think it's time I headed in now.”

A few minutes after he left, Alex noticed that he had left behind his room key on the chair. She grabbed it and went back to the hotel with the good intention of returning it. But when she got to the right floor, he was nowhere to be seen. Figuring he had probably just gone to her and Steven's room once he realized he was locked out, she went and opened her own door.

Voices from within stopped her from entering or even fully opening the door. She didn't know what it was, perhaps something in Steven's tone which had her frozen in place, peeking in through a crack in the door. Xabi was there, standing in front of Steven who was sitting on the unmade bed, looking like he hadn't woken up but a few seconds ago.

“I'm going to be going away for awhile,” Xabi said with a ring of sadness. “I don't know when I'll be coming back this time so I...” his voice broke slightly and his hands shot up to cover his face, unable to finish his sentence.

Steven stood immediately, taking his friend into his arms at once, hushing comfortingly in his ear. “You can't leave again, Xabs. You know I can't stand it when you leave.”

“It's too late. I can feel it happening. Gravity is getting so much stronger. I can barely stand.” Steven shushed him some more in a soothing manner, pulling the other man down on the bed with him so they could lay together. Alex watched as Steven wrapped one arm around Xabi's back and used the other to cradle his head into the crook of his neck. “I'm slipping away, Steven. I don't think I'll be coming back any time soon. Much worse than last time. Much worse. I could feel it building a long ways off but I thought I would have time still, at least until after the trip.”

Steven just shook his head, periodically kissing the top of his friends hair, a pained look crossing his features at the words. “Don't say stuff like that. You're such a bastard. A last hurrah this trip was supposed to be, huh? Just don't say stuff like that. Shhhhh.”

Alex nearly jumped when she felt a hand on her shoulder but when she looked, it was only Jamie, peering through the crack in the door above her head. He didn't say anything, just frowned slightly. “Just focus on the good, mate. Like that time you helped me study for my math exam, remember? We stayed up all night, you wouldn't let me fall asleep. Then after the test-” Steven's voice slowly faded away as Jamie pushed the door slowly closed so the two men inside wouldn't notice that they had been watching them.

“What's going on, Jamie?” Alex asked, wrapping her arms around her body. The grim look on the other man's face made her fearful. “What's wrong with Xabi? He's not... dying is he?”  
“No, but he'll be leaving us just the same.”

“I don't understand. Where's he going? Why does Steven look so afraid?” But Jamie just shook his head.

“He's in love with him, you know. Steven. I'm not saying it to hurt your feelings but it's better you find out now. He always has been, since they were just lads at school. But Xabi always said no. Xabi only has flings, he can't get serious with anyone. And being with Steven would be as serious as it gets. They can't be together, do you understand?”

Alex nodded slowly, unsure if Jamie was trying to tell her she didn't have to worry about Steven leaving her for the person he's loved his whole life or merely just letting her know the score. Either way it hurt a little to hear him say. “At the beach today Xabi told me that Steven was going to marry me,” she found herself saying, feeling instantly silly to repeat the words out loud.

A soft look appeared on Jamie's face as he gave her an awkward one armed hug, his own attempt at comfort. “No one knows Steven better than Xabi does. If he said it, it'll come true. Look, let's-” But whatever he was going to say was cut off by Steven leaving the room, a few more worry lines on his forehead than before.

“Xabi's asleep inside. Let's not bug him, okay love?” he said softly despite the harshness of his facial features. Alex nodded, not wanting to interfere in whatever was going on. It was obviously more serious than anyone was going to share with her. “I'm going out for a drink.”

Jamie grabbed Steven's arm, stopping him from going to the elevators and whispered something in his ear. The younger man quickly went through a mixture of emotions, first completely and utter despair, hopelessness, and finally anger.

“Fuck off, Jamie. I've done this before. I've pulled him out of this before. I'll fucking well do it again, alright?” Jamie let go of him, raising his hands up as a sign of surrender but he kept looking at the door Steven had just come out from, worriedly. Steven pushed past him, mumbling about that drink again.

“Come on, Jamie. Let's meet Nicola for lunch then?” she asked, trying to lighten the dark mood that had settled over the hallway. But in the back of her mind, all she could think about was the image of Xabi curled into Steven's chest, receiving all the love any one man could offer. She wondered that if he did end up asking her to marry him once Xabi was gone off to wherever it was he was going, if she would be the one receiving all that love or if it would go away with him.

She decided maybe it was better not to think about.


End file.
